Wishing Upon Fading Stars
by LovelyLivy
Summary: Every year she recieves something from each of them. A DVD. A black rose. A long-stemmed lily. An awkward approach. A sentimental story. She longs for him and his white orchid. It's the only thing that keeps her alive- or dead- however you look at it.


**Depressing. No, I do not have thoughts of suicide. Just in the mood for some hardcore angst. Bare with me. Obviously JD happened. That's the major spoiler. Have fun! Lol. :p**

**Livvy**

* * *

Freshly cut grass stains the bottom of tan slacks. Winding, gravely paths allow entrance through the sacred ground, mimicking the winding lives of the people buried nearly eight feet under.

Every few feet a piece of marble lie, marking a life that ended too soon. Death always seems to come too soon. In her case, it's too true.

The land is busy today. Between the minutes passing a new flowery bouquet is sat somewhere on the green turf. Between mere seconds a sob resounds through the somber air. Remembering can be the hardest thing. Remembering red hair and a sparkling ambition that matched her emerald orbs.

This continues through the hours- the loved ones coming to mourn and to find closure. She was taken from them so suddenly (and only few know the _real _truth). They come, though.

Six people who knew her in the best way they could. Seeing her through her good times and her rough patches.

A bubbly black-haired Goth is abnormally dismal, having cried herself into silence earlier, now standing ramrod straight next to a slightly chubby man. He stares ahead as well, unable to comprehend any of what has just taken place. He is good with computers; not expressing emotions.

Partners lean on each other in silent support. Not in a literal sense, no. Tense exteriors to match numb interiors, and talking has never been their favorite thing either. The Israeli and the Italian also battle a separate monster; guilt. He should have listened to his partner, she should have relied on her gut instinct. Because of ignored reflexes, her good, good friend and previous partner is cold as ice. He can't stop remembering the way he acted towards her after a certain Arms Dealer's daughter had walked from his life.

It was never the dead woman's fault.

A known Medical Examiner is next. He still recalls cutting open her soft skin just a day prior. Though nightmares have not plagued him in a long while, he is certain tonight they will make a stark reappearance. He still remembers diagnosing her cause of death like he remembers her laughing at one of his stories. Water pools in his eyes, which he wipes away with frustration.

It would have happened anyway.

A dark skinned woman comes to grieve for her boss. The boss who bought her a scarf in Paris. The boss who was never unfair. Rubbing small circles around her ever-growing stomach, she smiles wistfully at the thought of having lunch with her just days before. An invitation to her shower is buried beneath stacks of papers in a briefcase; addressed to the woman, the boss, who is dead.

Soon the sun disappears beneath crisp, cold, earth. Shedding life in a new place; making life wane. He only arrives when the stars are bright and the moon thrives.

Jenny loves the moon.

The spunky redhead waits for him. She sits, cross legged, two feet from the specific headstone he wishes to visit. Bare toes scrunching under the solid, cold, planet. The freedom, the comfortable air, feels good. She hasn't felt this free in a long time.

She watches his tall form exit his black car, she watches him stride in slight nostalgia at the whole situation. Seeing everyone else isn't like seeing him. She realizes she hasn't had the time to really _watch _him in a long time, and it used to be one of her favorite activities.

Watching him sleep so peacefully as sun filters through blinds on a hot day in Serbia, blissful from love-making and sensations that make her scream. Studying his thoughtful face as he mulls over a current case in the dark confines of his basement, leaning against his boat. Basking in his blue eyes as he professes everything he means to her; regardless of the simple fact it's all just a dream. She misses seeing him. She misses _him. _

And yet up until nearly two days ago; she could've stopped missing anything...

Looking into his sad sapphire eyes, she realizes she can't change a damn thing. It kills her all over again. Pun very much intended.

An owl hoots in a tree a few feet away, she feels his boots thud softly on the ground and reverberate through her torso. He never does respond to her presence.

Still, her emerald eyes study, and she speaks like he hears her. She wishes he could hear her.

"Haven't seen you in a while. It's been too long. Seeing how I saw you a few days ago, I'm feeling a bit like a nagging wife who's husband has gone on a business trip."

Stopping just short of her longs legs, he looks on, his mouth tilting down in a frown. She wishes to stand and kiss him. Brazen as the action might be, just to see those lines gone.

"Though this is a lot different, isn't it, Jethro? Never expected to be in this position. What did I expect? Some white, silk, maybe? Clouds. Angels. Maybe even a band of trumpets awaiting my arrival at pristine golden gates... Besides, I'm not the Susie-Home-Maker type, am I? That right there, is a big difference in the situations," her alto voice trails off.

"And there's the fact you won't be waiting for me at the terminal gates. Which is ironic, considering I left you at one. That was the actual plane, though, so maybe it doesn't count."

The onyx sky contrasts with the light of the moon shimmering through cold, lifeless, tree limbs. He still ignores her. He was always so good at that when he was angry. She prays to some god to show some mercy and make him not angry with her.

She never meant for any of this to happen.

"If it hurts like this now...how do I...do it?"

* * *

A year passes, and she welcomes seeing her friends. Their lives have changed in so many ways, yet their the same people she's always loved.

Tony brings her an old DVD and props it up against unwelcome grey marble. Ziva brings her lilies. Ducky tells her a story of his youth. Abby sniffles and presents a black rose. Tim doesn't come, and she doesn't blame him one bit. Nor does Cynthia, but from Abby's update a few months ago, Lillian Jennifer is the cutest little thing ever to walk the planet, and Cynthia didn't adjust well to Vance's bull.

It hits her just as dusk arrives that she hasn't seen him in a year.

Unlike the others, he never made any more visits. The thoughts make her feel selfish, that she'd want him to grieve over her like that. But if Jenny could only get a glimpse of his face...after all, Abby telling her that 'Gibbs is so sad that your gone', makes her want to see _something. _Curiosity killed the cat, but that won't be a problem. She's already dead.

It strikes her that she might not even see him at all tonight. It makes her chest hurt; a dull ache, that won't go away no matter how many times she closes her eyes.

So when a black corvette pulls up to her lane just before midnight, she doesn't hold back surprise. He looks...good. A few new wrinkles around his eyes. A little more white than grey. She doesn't mind, and if her heart could still beat, it would be racing.

He pays her no mind. Blue eyes more guarded, more closed off. This she doesn't like. She wishes to make them light in anger. They argued like no other when he could hear her.

She misses him too much, again. The last year had been so hard...to sit, to watch, to wait, for any sign that it was all just a horrible dream and soon she'd wake at her desk. She want him to carry her off into some unrealistic sunset. For the first time in her after-life/life, she wanted a fairytale ending. One which she would never get.

With each step he takes towards her the ache in her chest becomes more pronounced.

"I've been thinking," she begins. Now is her chance.

"About us. About Europe. About mistakes, regrets, all that stuff we always tried to avoid because of some stupid rule. I need you to know, Jethro, that I never intended to hurt you," blue lips murmur the last part because she feels she might choke on it.

Gibbs stands like a statue, looking on blankly at that lone headstone, one which she wishes to kick to the side like sheets. It shames her. It disgusts her.

Nothing should have come out like this.

"I was wrong. I loved you, no, I _love_ you, and I was scared. I didn't think about you because I was so afraid that you might hurt me. And in the process I hurt you. For what it's worth, I'm sorry. I need you to know that Paris was the best part of my entire life. _You _were."

He doesn't respond, she wishes he would, and she slowly begins to lose hope.

* * *

Another year passes, one filled with epiphanies and with solidity. Each moment is like a ton of cement being thrust upon her slowly fading torso. She's never felt so alone.

Ziva doesn't come. It puts a pain in her chest until she realizes it's better this way; her friends need to find peace. When Tony, carrying a cup of coffee, informs her of the events that have taken place just weeks before, Ziva's disappearance only scares her.

But Ziva is tough, and so she brushes it off. McGee doesn't come. Ducky stops briefly before work, standing twenty feet away, bowing his head, and then leaving again. Abby comes, cries a bit, and gives her two black roses. She wishes she could hug her so tightly.

Day passes, and she notes it's much colder than last year. A nice night for some coffee and a fire. But there is no need; nothing like that effects her anymore. She wishes to cry, but nothing her eyes only go drier.

He comes just after the sun goes down, and she notes that there are no stars in the sky tonight. Jethro looks just as blank as the year before; it's unsettling. And she suddenly wants him to leave very much.

"Is this how it's going to be, Jethro? Every year, you stand here and just _stare. _Does your new girlfriend know where you are now?" It then strikes her she doesn't even know one vital fact.

"Have you moved on, Jethro?"

She sounds tired, and he shifts weight onto his other leg. She notes that he wears jeans, even though it is frigid outside. "You ever thought about wearing a jacket?"

He licks his lips suddenly, and opens his mouth to speak. Her eyes go wide with shock and her breath catches in her throat. He heard her!

"Ziva's gone," he says throatily. The emotion that those two words emit make her want to cringe. He sounds close to tears, though his face still looks blank.

"I've heard," Jenny admits softly.

"DiNozzo...he's crushed. The similarities of them...and us...they're so solid, Jen," he shakes his head, and the fact he's never looked her in the eye crushes her even further.

He never heard her.

"I don't think DiNozzo will ever get over her..."

They always had a thing for reading between the lines applying to words. It's what made talking to him and communication in a relationship so infuriating. They never just came out and said things. And he would never get over her.

Then, his eyes go bright, and his face crumples. Her nails dig into the grass, pulling, unable to stand the look of _pain...for her._

"I miss you..._so much_, Jenny."

* * *

Two more years, and things seem to even out. A routine is falling into place.

Ziva is back. Broken, but alive. Tony and she have patched up their relationship as best they could; she sees a man from Miami. McGee still doesn't come; unsurprisingly. Abby brings black roses, Ducky tells stories. Jethro comes at midnight and doesn't speak.

That night, she asks, "I thought you promised me last year you would start smiling?"

He won't speak to her. She is invisible. Life has no purpose, when it comes to him.

When she sees him, she thinks that Death has never been so cruel.

* * *

When the five year mark hits, everything changes. She makes it change.

McGee arrives midday. He smiles. Says that Abby can't come because she's at home, resting her feet. She's six and a half months pregnant with his child, stubborn, and wishes she could be here. He brings her five black roses. The stuttering boy she remembers is so alive, so open, that she has never been more proud. In five years everything changes. Maturity suits him.

Tony and Ziva arrive together. When she watches them, holding hands, approach her grave, she can't help but laugh. The Mossad Officer and the frat boy. Who would have ever thought? They seem reserved, at peace. They seem happy. Watching Ziva give her a bouquet of white lilies and lay her head on Tony's shoulder, Jenny knows that everything will be okay.

Ducky looks old, but healthy. He walks without a cane, and he still works at NCIS. He tells her a story of a man and a woman who work together, who are sent on an assignment in a foreign country, who fall in love, and who live happily ever-after. She wishes she could say how much she thought of him as a father. How much she cared for him. But as he leaves, he has seemingly rendered her speechless. She gazes after his car with meaning.

With the day passing too quickly, though in a good way, she watches as Jethro's car makes its way down the gravelly road. A slim, jean-clad leg adjusts beneath her barely there body. She rubs her bullet wounds that seem to ache strangely. Jenny hasn't literally _felt_ this human in a while.

When he strides up and stands next to her, she clears her throat and rolls her neck to get comfortable. It doesn't hurt as much as it used to. His features, however, are still the same. She intends to change that.

"Still no jacket, I see. Last year was record-breaking, I heard. Then again, you always were a hard-ass like that. But I know you. It's just an act. Kind of like how you can say everything's alright, when it's not," Jenny seems definite, when her unfeeling heart is anything but.

"We can't keep doing this. Something has to give. I can't deny you moving on, and nor can you, me. It's time, Jethro. It's been five years. Each year, the same white orchid. You know how I favored them. Each year the same empty promise." Sighing, her nostrils flare, frustrated by the whole situation.

"You could never hear me, but I always made you promise me something! I just expected it to happen _naturally_! You promised me you'd start smiling again. The year before that, you'd stop drinking so heavily- Ziva told me! Before that, to see reason and forgiveness. Before that...before that," her voice shakes heavily.

"You promised me you'd _let me go!"_

His hands lift to his face, rubbing his eyes, unhappy at the tears sparkling in them.

"You promised me nothing was wrong, Jen," he whispers harshly.

A silent knife tears through her pale torso. Everything burns. A bitter laugh rings out through the silent cemetery like broken bells. She feels dirty, volatile, shaky.

"I couldn't...I couldn't hurt you anymore. Understand."

She moves, ever so lithely, and stands next to him. She hardly ever stands anymore.

Brushing a lock of red behind her ear, she looks at him, studies him, for she knows that tonight may very well be the last time. "I can't keep loving you."

"Why did you do it, Jen?" Jethro whispers, his eyes squinting. He's never been a weak man, and it angers her that this is the exception.

"We took too many wrong turns. So many chances that we wasted...that's why I'm still here. You have to let me go, Jethro. Like Shannon. Like Kelly," she breathes the words in his ear, praying that he can hear her.

"I'm dead, Jethro. And I miss you."

"I miss you Jenny, but I understand, I think. You were always so different. I shouldn't have let you walk away."

"I would've just started running," she smirks slightly.

"We could've been something."

"I know," she murmurs, nodding.

"I wish you could see the stars one last time, I wish I could see you one more time," Jethro whispers into the night.

"I can, Jethro. It's all going to be okay." Jenny purses her lips. Her eyes feel too dry.

"I need to let you go. But I do love you," he says the words with finality, and as he turns to walk back to his car he literally passes through her.

For just a second she feels everything. Heated nights, lazy mornings, playful banters, snippy arguments, sincere professions, long stares, his kiss. She remembers it all.

Watching his silver hair leave, she slowly fades, last words on her now pretty pink lips.

She personifies life, she lives it. She leaves it. That would always be Jenny Sheppard.

_"I love you too. I just wish it was enough."_


End file.
